Mages some info!

G'day to you all , weather you're a fireballing minigun or a frosty the snowman.

Since I have take the job as Class leader of mages, I thought we could need a forum of our own, where you can ask question or just talk freely about you're class and specs. I will also here announce if I what you to have anything special spec or pots when we raid different places.

About ZA , prolly you have seen that some of us do alot of ZA, the reason why you maybe arent invite is that we dont have the whole instance under control and we need only the best geared people and we need to have certain class, yes this sucks I know since I would be happy to invite you all to join us, but unfonately this isn't a possiblity, but that doesn't mean you can attent to the raid nor ask if there is a possiblity for a spot, but mainly the ZA group is already been made, the reason I write this is so that you wont get offened, and I dont want you to feel bad about it. Hope this clearlify some of questions about ZA runs. If you have futher concern please just write em here, and ill answer them.

Specs, what is a pve spec and what is a pvp spec.
Well you prolly already know to a limit what is pvp and whats pve , but make it clear ill describe some specs below which I see as pve, and again you are welcome to suggest new types of specs and ideas of specs you have been thinking about.

Abit about overall dps, what types of stats do the mage need?
All this is based on theorycraft.
To make a priority list of stats this is how it looks:
Hit > spelldamage > Haste > Crits
Now you prolly wondering about a few things, but fear not read about more and ill explain it all for you.

Why hit?
Well what damagde does a fireball/frostbolt do if it the target resist, yes you'r right 0. Every mage has a starting miss (resist ) chance of 16% on bosses , the lower the lvl mob the lower miss chance is, that means if you fire of a 100 fireballs /frostbolt, 16 of them will get resisted in my case that is about 40k damage without counting crits, thats alot of damage just gone out the door. So therefore hit is the prolly the most important stat for us, but remember there is a cap , cause not matter how big your to hit is, there will always be a 1% chance that the spell gets resistet. So what is the cap then, well with elemental precision from the first tier in frost we can get the cap down to 164 , with out it , you be needing around a 200 to hit in order to maximize your damage output.

Spelldamage?
Well the harder we hit the more damage we do, this shouldn't be a Wohhaaa experince to you, but spelldamage iis a steady increase in dps outcome. So is there a difference between fireballs and frostbolts? Yes of couse , you stupid CL , one is fire and one is frost you can say! But there is also another difference a hidden one, we all know that frostbolts do less damage then fireballs, but also where fire get 80% from spelldamage (last 20% tax is because of the dot bonus) , frost only get around 60 % from spelldamage (since the slow effect takes 40 % tax). Is this fair , I dunno but thats not what we need to disguss , but have that in mind. That doesn't mean frost sucks big time, just means that the average dps output of frost is abit lower then fire.

Crit /haste?
A mage found that after you reach abour 32 % crit with a full fire spec, this starts to scale very badly in compairison with the rest of what we can pick be it haste/spelldamage. Same goes for full frost or thou I am not intirely sure what amount of crit you have to to make it scale bad. The only spec that shines and keeps shining with more and more crit is arcane/fire, this get the full effect from higher then 32% crit. Since that build is around big crits and heavy ignites!

Haste , increase your casting time on spells, woha so that basicly mean you get of even more dmg within the same time spam. But haste is an expensive stat to buy, without nerfing any of the other things liste, so be carefully. 1% haste = 1% damage increase, and it prolly the best scalling stat we have it is basicly awesome, but I will say it again , be weary mage for what might seem as a buff , might also have the downsite of making you rest.

About raiding
It is always giefs a plus to be potted up for raids and having repair and having reagents in stock

Specs for raiding:
Well in order to find the best spec for you , you need to find out what kind of mage are you, you have 3 options:
Frost , survibilty and control
Fire, High damage output, and less suvibility
Arcane: A mix that can go each way.
Here is some exsamples of specs:


Frost:
0/0/61 , is a decent raid spec, you get all the survibilty from Frost, but inorder to maximize your damage output , you need to be fully concentrated on blowing your Cooldowns on the right moment.
Main nuke: Frostbolts and Water elemental(WE).
Dps circle : Summon WE, frostbolt,frostbolt, as soon as WE disappear cold snap and resummon it, frostbolt frostbolt, so basicly try to have your WE out at all times and other then that spam frostbolt, to keep winters chill up.

10/0/51, another high surviblity spec, with all the goodies from Frost, but more mana converative then the 0/0/61 because you will gain access to clearcasting.
Main nuke: Frostbolts and Water elemental(WE).
Dps circle : Summon WE, frostbolt,frostbolt, as soon as WE disappear cold snap and resummon it, frostbolt frostbolt, so basicly try to have your WE out at all times and other then that spam frostbolt, to keep winters chill up.

Fire:

34/27/0 A crit build, with spell power and fireball crits your ignite will tick for an insane amount, also you will have most of the crit talents from fire and arcane powers. So a high burst damage build , but there is one flaw with this build and that is that elemental precision isn't in the build, and therefore your hit will have to at it max which is about 200.
Main nukes: scorch and fireball
dps circle: keep scorch debuff and just fire of fireballs


So now we come to what the mages around our globe calls the KING of pve build, the deep fire
There are 2 versions of the deep fire build, the mana conserverative and Icey veins, which both have there own strength.

10/48/3 This build is a massive fire build, with which have the godlike ability "CLEARCAST" , which in other words are a free spell. So if you feel like you have mana issues on a boss fight I would suggest you try this build, for might save you from having to wand, cause everything is on cooldown.
Main nukes: scorch and fireballs.
dps circle: keep scorch debuff and just fire of fireballs

2/48/11 Also a massive fire build, with even more damage posentials , with Icey veins, this is a complet must if you have fight Ondu on the Dps meter . The thing about this build is that it drains your mana fast when you pop icey veins so be sure to use your abilities when ever possible. This in my eyes are the best possible spec in pve if you got the mana for it, Damage on Trash mobs is kinda low, but if the other dps classes, could see you on boss fights where the boss around 20% and you pop all cooldowns and just let molten fury+trinket+icey vein + combustion , giving you 6-7k crits they would cry their eyes out. This is what makes smile
Main nukes: scorch and fireballs.
dps circle: keep scorch debuff and just fire of fireballs

Arcane

61/0/0 A full arcane build, with all the goodies in the arcane tree, spell power , arcane power and mind mastery!
Main nukes : Scorch, Arcane missiles, arcane blast
Dps circle: The dps circle is abit different for arcane then anyother specs, since you have to watch out for procs, again the famous CLEARCASTING proc. So all in all the circle will look like this : AB(arcane blast),AB(arcane blast),AB(arcane blast), Scorch until AB debuff disappear then AB again, WHEN EVER CLEARCASTING GOES OFF, USE ARCANE MISSILES this is very important since this will increase your over all dps!!!

40/21/0 or 40/0/21 Both good arcane specs but abit more specialized in one of the two other spell schools.
Main nukes for 40/21/0 : Scorch, Arcane missiles, arcane blast
Dps circle: The dps circle is abit different for arcane then anyother specs, since you have to watch out for procs, again the famous CLEARCASTING proc. So all in all the circle will look like this : AB(arcane blast),AB(arcane blast),AB(arcane blast), Scorch until AB debuff disappear then AB again, WHEN EVER CLEARCASTING GOES OFF, USE ARCANE MISSILES this is very important since this will increase your over all dps!!!

Main nukes for 40/0/21: Frostbolts,Arcane missiles, arcane blast
Dps circle: The dps circle is abit different for arcane then anyother specs, since you have to watch out for procs, again the famous CLEARCASTING proc. So all in all the circle will look like this : AB(arcane blast),AB(arcane blast),AB(arcane blast), Frostbolts until AB debuff disappear then AB again, WHEN EVER CLEARCASTING GOES OFF, USE ARCANE MISSILES this is very important since this will increase your over all dps!!!

Thats about it, there is thousands of spec out there , that I havent covered but these are the most used and therefore will be called the best pve wise, but as said before if you have any specs that you think is better describe em and lets have a look on them, but these specs should be only pve wise since I dont want to go thou 9 gazillon of pvp specs, since these tend to have a more personal opions in them.

Also I would love to have the other classes describe there specs and opion on there classes in there own thead since we might give a helping hand to members , who are abit torn to which specs are the best for them. So everyone please help your class since I have only looked at the mages forum and theory, and to be honest only have a slight feeing on what other classes need and should have.


Best regards
Zacy

Very good initiative Zacy! I think this will be very helpful for some mages in the guild